SKOWHEGAN – Undefeated. Five straight Class A championships. Nine of the last 10 Eastern Maine titles.

You can bet the Skowhegan Area High School field hockey team is eternally grateful that it won’t have to set any of those streaks on the table against Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School again this fall.

Skowhegan squirmed away in the second half for a 2-0 victory Wednesday afternoon, officially adding another regional championship trophy that just about everyone not dressed in green expected the Indians to win from the opening whistle.

So much for conventional wisdom. Oxford Hills (12-5-1) stood toe-to-toe with a program that has lost only one sectional playoff game since 1996, undaunted by either its resounding 7-0 loss to Skowhegan in the first game of the season or a 3-0 verdict in the Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference championship clash on Oct. 13.

“It was basically a one-nothing game until the very end, said Cindy Goddard, who coached Oxford Hills to the Eastern championship game for the first time in her 18-year tenure. “I think Skowhegan probably was expecting it to be an easy game. Hopefully we made it a little tougher than they thought.”

No need to hope. For all its history and furious firepower, including six players who have scored 10 or more goals during the season, Skowhegan (18-0) was the team that looked tentative throughout the first half and the early stages of the second.

The Indians eventually cashed in twice on a steady parade of penalty corners. Bethany Sevey blasted home a feed from Lindsey Pinkham to snap a stalemate with 19:19 remaining in regulation.

Becca Roy re-directed another Sevey shot past Oxford Hills goaltender Aleksys Pike with 1:47 left.

“These are kids, you know? They’re 16, 17, a few of them 18 years old. There’s a lot of pressure on them, and there are a lot of expectations,” said Skowhegan coach Paula Doughty. “Oxford Hills had nothing to lose today. Cindy must be very pleased.”

Pike, a sophomore, made an assortment of amazing stops among her 12 saves. Skowhegan also clanged the post once in each half.

Seniors Tia Pratt, Tara Brown, Diann Ramsey, Joanna Strong and Sam Dolloff fueled a sensational defensive effort by the Vikings that wreaked havoc with Skowhegan’s passing game throughout the scoreless first half.

“Tia Pratt is such a great player,” said Goodard. “When she’s running around in the middle of that defense, it breaks up a lot of the things that Skowhegan wants to do.”

Skowhegan mustered only one shot on goal in the first 20 minutes of the game. Oxford Hills enjoyed its best early scoring opportunity with five minutes in the half, when Teira Durgin and Kaitlin Crockett worked the ball inside and earned a penalty corner.

Indians goalie Megan Smith (five saves) alertly cut off the Vikings’ bid at the left post, however, and the shot rattled harmlessly off the outside of the cage.

“They were a little afraid to lose in the first half,” Doughty said of her team. “I think we got rid of a lot of our nerves at halftime.”

Likewise, Oxford Hills and its dozen seniors shook their awe of Skowhegan as the season progressed. Doughty said there was “no comparison” between the Vikings she saw in the rout on Sept. 1 and the ones she witnessed Wednesday.

Goddard agreed. “Skowhegan plays a pretty intense summer program,” she said. “At the start of the season, when you’re still working on things and not quite sure where everybody is going yet, they can really take you apart. They weren’t getting up and down the field like they did in that game. We felt like we had our opportunities today.”